


a year in the life

by gettingby



Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: M/M, Post-Book 2: Wayward Son
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-29
Updated: 2020-05-29
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:09:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24446380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gettingby/pseuds/gettingby
Summary: Simon and Baz are at a low point when they return from America - but a lot can happen in a year.Post-WS; tw for depression & brief suicidal ideation. (things get better, though. kind of)
Relationships: Penelope Bunce & Simon Snow, Tyrannus Basilton "Baz" Pitch/Simon Snow
Comments: 12
Kudos: 92





	a year in the life

JUNE

I don’t sit next to Baz on the plane. Not on purpose - I’m just trailing behind him, and the aisles are so cramped and narrow that it’s impossible to backtrack or move around. I end up in the row of two by the window with Penny. Baz, Shepard and Agatha are sitting in the middle cluster of three. Both Shepard and Agatha are awkwardly glancing from me to Baz, as if they’re trying to figure out if they should offer to switch seats. Penny doesn’t bother; she just sighs tiredly and lays her head on the seat back.

I close my eyes and try to think of something, anything, else. I think about the beach again. I understand why Agatha wanted to run away. Why she came to California. It felt good, for a few moments at least, to feel the water lapping at my ankles, to imagine myself drifting away to sea. Like I could have been the ocean, with no beginning or end, no past or future. I could have had a fucking second to  _ breathe _ . 

And the thoughts. They were good, too - I felt stronger than I had in a long time. I thought about asking Dr. Wellbelove to take off my wings and tail. I thought about dropping out of uni, officially. I thought about burning my insides until they were bare and clean and raw, not jumbled and bloody. I  _ didn’t _ think about Baz, because I don’t think I could feel clean and empty if Baz were around, even just in my head. Instead, I thought about breaking up with him. Imagined him walking out of my life. Laughing on the Strip, hand in hand with Lamb. In the arms of an unknown man, in front of a Paris nightclub. Sharing coffee with a faceless bloke at the cafe near LSE, their hands brushing as they revise together. Looking happy and content and  _ free _ .

It hurts, of course. It hurts like fucking hell because I love Baz; I love him so much I think it could kill me. But I’m used to being hurt. The pain of losing Baz - it would be a drop in a bucket. A bucket in an  _ ocean _ . At any rate, what I want doesn’t matter.

Something about the white noise of the plane makes me feel like it’s okay to cry. As if with my eyes closed, I’m actually by myself, and it’s fine. I feel the tears well up, and then a couple are escaping, though I’ve screwed my eyelids tight. I try to breathe, and I try not to think, and then I fall asleep.

SEPTEMBER

It’s midnight on a Tuesday. Penny has class early tomorrow. She should be in bed, but instead, she’s shouting. At me.

Penny and I are  _ fighting _ .

Penny and I haven’t fought before. Ever. In our near decade of friendship, we’ve always maintained a united front. We both love to fight, just not with each other. It’s an unspoken rule.

I’m crying and she’s crying, and I’m pulling on my curls and she’s pulling on her curls. I can’t even remember exactly what we started fighting about. I think it happened on Sunday, when she forgot to watch  _ The Great British Bake Off _ with me because she’d made plans to see a film with Shepard. I don’t know what I was the most angry about - that she forgot about our plans? That she didn’t tell me she was going on a date with  _ Shepard _ ? That I thought there were two hours on Sunday where I could turn my brain off and sit with Penny and not feel - the way I feel...and then the rug was pulled out from under me?

I didn’t say anything, not then. Because I didn’t think it made sense to be as angry with Penny as I was. But things were weird between us, afterwards. I didn’t know what to say. I couldn’t look at her without a weird sensation coiling in my belly. A couple of times, I remembered what had happened and I couldn’t catch my breath.

And...now. She’s picked up takeout from the curry place down the street. She sets it on the counter and asks if I want to watch the episode of  _ GBBO _ now instead. The thought is like sandpaper on my tongue. I shrug. She tells me something about her classes that day. I shrug again. And then...she goes off.

She shouts and curses and cries, almost immediately, almost simultaneously. I’m frozen to the couch, looking down at my phone - I can’t meet her eyes. I don’t know what to do, because I’ve never seen her like this. I mean, Penny and I have almost  _ died _ together. Multiple times. But I’ve never seen anything like this before.

“I feel like I’m on eggshells with you  _ constantly _ \- I’m not trying to replace you, I swear, I just - I just need to be around someone that isn’t you, sometimes - A lot of the time -”

She’s looking at me like she expects me to defend myself, but I’m not going to. Penny is nothing if not truthful.

It does hurt to hear, but it’s not unexpected. (I try to have no expectations, and not to think about things.) When Penny was with Micah, I kept her at arms’ length because I knew she would go to America and leave me. Of course, at that point, I thought I’d leave first. (By dying, I mean.)

But since I lost my magic, I think she’s just biding her time. I mean, Penny loves magic more than anything. Her mum barely thinks Normals are  _ people _ . I don’t have anything to offer her, not really. I used to give her adventure and a purpose; I think she took me to America to find those things again. But I don’t think it worked. Because I’m not invincible anymore - I can’t protect her - and we almost died, and it’s not fun anymore.

(I don’t want to admit it, but I think about it sometimes. What it would feel like if the Humdrum killed me. If the Mage killed me. If the Next Blood killed me. Sometimes I think it’s so unfair that they didn’t. Sometimes it’s comforting to imagine the  _ nothing _ of it all.)

I think Penny is the only good thing I have left. I mean, I guess I’m still with Baz, although I haven’t seen him in a week. We haven’t even texted - a few days ago he sent me a picture of a funny advert he saw on a bus whilst walking to campus, but I couldn’t bring myself to reply.

So I don’t have Baz, not really - as soon as he gets over this misplaced loyalty, he’ll be gone. As soon as he gets some  _ proper _ alone time with another bloke, one that can actually treat him how he deserves, he’ll be gone.

Penny was the first person I had, and she’ll be the last. It seems kind of fitting, I guess.

I feel something warm wrap around me - Penny’s arms. I didn’t notice when she stopped shouting. She pulls me in and rests her head on my shoulder. I can feel wetness along the collar of my shirt - her tears. And along my jaw - mine.

Neither Penny nor I really like physical affection. It’s been a long time since we’ve hugged, and I almost forgot what it was like. She’s soft and warm, but I feel smothered; the feeling of not being able to breathe is back. I don’t want to push her off, though; I don’t have the energy, and I’m afraid she might leave forever if I do.

So I retreat inside of myself - I go into a place where I’m not here, not on this couch, hugging the person I love most in the world, thinking about how she will inevitably leave me. I let her warmth and her tears soak into me, but I don't think about it. I just pretend like I’m not really there.

DECEMBER

Baz is bundled in a black coat and classy tartan scarf, with shiny black boots. I’m wearing the colourful jumper Baz gave me for Christmas last year - only the second time I’ve ever worn it. I’m wearing some posh jeans he dressed me in, too. I feel like somebody else, walking through the Christmas market.

I have hot chocolate in one hand. The other’s knocking into Baz as we walk. I think he almost grabbed my hand, earlier, but he’s afraid to do those things with me, so he stopped himself.

London is always dreary in the winter, but I think it seems greyer than usual today. In my bright wool jumper, I feel out of place.  _ Grey skies, grey boyfriend, grey eyes _ . And  _ me _ .

Then, I think I see him.

It’s just a flash, really. A quick view of some tall bloke walking by in a bright green jumper. Festive, honestly. He’s got sandy hair and a cleft in his chin - and suddenly I feel like a doused fire. A tire they’ve let the air out of. I stop walking and watch Baz pass right by me and blend into the crowd, as he walks ahead without realizing.

It feels good to see him walk away like that, when he doesn’t mean to. Like I’m practicing for when he  _ does _ mean to.

Too soon, he notices that I’ve fallen behind and stops, picking his way through the crowd back towards me.

His gaze is too much. I feel itchy in this jumper. Too hot, too eye-catching, too  _ exposed _ . I want to be grey like Baz and the rest of London. The colors feel a lot like lying, and I’m sick of lying. I’m sick of pretending for Baz and Penny’s sake.

“What’s wrong?” Baz asks immediately when he catches up to me.

“The jumper’s itchy.”

He catches the strained note in my voice. Wordlessly, he manoeuvres us out of the market crowd and towards a space on the path. He sips his coffee and we lean against a building, side by side. I think he tries to knock my shoulder with his own, but I feel too jumpy. I slide away, just a bit, and his face falls. I’m so sick of pretending.

“Why don’t you just leave?”

He pushes a stray hair away from his face with his gloved hand. “We can leave if you want to.”

“I mean,  _ leave _ leave. Like, leave me.”

“Do you want me to?”

“Yes. I mean - I guess. No.  _ I _ don’t want you to, but you should. You’d be so much happier.”

He’s fishing in his coat pocket for a cigarette. “So you keep telling me.”

I slap the fag out of his hand before he can light it and he meets my eyes, exasperated. “So why don’t you  _ listen _ ?”

In the blink of an eye, he steps away from me and lights another. Baz takes a long drag, then blows the smoke directly in my face. “Since when do I listen to  _ you _ , Snow?”

FEBRUARY

I don’t know  _ why _ this is the time I decide to call my magickal psychologist. I guess because usually, the thought that I should call her comes up at odd hours of the night, like when I’m jolted awake by a nightmare, or when I’m having so many thoughts that I can’t sleep.

But today, I haven’t gotten out of bed. There’s a pack of cider on the floor of my bedroom, and Penny is at uni for the whole day. I don’t even have to get up. When I get hungry or thirsty, I just pop open another can of cider. (I do have to get up to piss a few times. I try putting it off, but needs must.)

I don’t know why I drink it. I guess I like the taste, a bit, and it’s convenient. Fills me up without me heating something up from the fridge. But the downside is, it makes me sad. When I’m a couple of ciders in, especially on an otherwise empty stomach, a hazy sort of feeling settles in my bones. I feel...lonely. Incredibly lonely. Like there’s nothing more than I want in the world than to curl my body against someone right now, but there’s no one there.

So I exit out of the Instagram explore page and Google her. I hit the link for her phone number and call.

I don’t really know what to say to her receptionist, but I can usually keep it together well enough around strangers. She says, “Oh! Simon,” when I introduce myself. Her voice gets a little  _ too _ syrupy sweet. I can’t wait to hang up and never call her again.

“Well, you’re in luck, sweetie. She had a cancellation this afternoon - she’ll call you back in an hour? Would that be okay?”

I throw myself back on my pillows, my heart beating faster. “Oh. Yeah. Uh, that would be okay.”

APRIL

It’s like the time with the chimera, only in reverse.

I’ve been poking and prodding, not even meaning to, really. Seeing if I can make Baz go off. Seeing how much he can take. I’ve been acting like a child, testing my limits, his boundaries.

Bringing crisps into his car, after he chided Penelope for eating in the passenger seat.

Keeping the TV on top volume, even though he’s already squeezing his noise-canceling headphones against his head.

Leaving the mugs dirty and strewn about, so he’s always got to find one and wash it before he can have his tea.

He doesn’t say anything. He never says anything. I can only tell by the clenching of his jaw or the exasperated breath that catches in his throat. He goes into the kitchen with arms full of used mugs and they clatter loudly in the sink as he washes them. Angrily. I imagine he’s plotting to murder me in his head.

The time it works, I don’t even mean it to. I shouldn’t have taken the lid off my Coke cup, but I was so thirsty and too impatient to drink it with the straw. I just popped the lid open and threw my head back. Felt the ice hit my lips - _so cold, and I’ve been so hot_ \- and then felt the car brake. The Coke spills everywhere - all over my T-shirt, the leather seats, the floor mats, Baz’s satchel.

“Merlin and  _ Morgana _ , Snow -” He pulls over immediately. His hands are clenching the steering wheel. “Get out. Now.”

I want to protest that he can’t just leave me on the sidewalk in London (even if it is a block from a Tube station) - but then he pulls out his wand and tries to spell the mess away. It works, mostly. He opens the window and tries to spell me clean, too. He huffs and pulls sanitizing wipes out of the dash. I expect him to start wiping at the sticky residue on the leather, but he tosses them at me instead. “You absolute fucking imbecile. Clean it up, arsehole.”

He sits there, white knuckles on the wheel, silently fuming as I wipe down the interior of his car, his satchel, and my trainers. I go to sit back down, but he snaps his fingers, not even looking at me. “Backseat, Snow. Front seat is for people who haven’t spilled their goddamn Maccie’s.”

“You’re a dick,” I reply, but I climb in the backseat anyway.

“And you’re an absolute fucking numpty.”

My heart is beating faster, my face is red and splotchy, but I feel like I can  _ breathe _ for once. Normally I’d fall silent, but instead I say, “Not my fault you drive like a madman.”

“A  _ madman _ \- Crowley, Snow. First of all, you’re lucky that I ferry your sorry arse around in the first place. I don’t understand why you don’t do anything for yourself - it’s not as if you were using magic for it before. You know I’m trying to balance interviews for my summer internship and classes are destroying me this semester, and yet you can’t be arsed to show any sympathy! Would it  _ kill  _ you to pick up after yourself so Bunce and I aren’t doing it constantly?”

The redness in my face has spread to my eyes and neck and throat now, and I’m sobbing. Baz’s voice only has a bit of hopeless tremble to it. He’s  _ right _ , he’s so right, I have been an absolute fucking numpty - 

“Simon? I - I shouldn’t have snapped at you, I’m sorry.”

“Shut the fuck up,” I reply between sobs. “Stop treating me like I’m made of glass. I can take it. Tell me when I’m being a dick to you, Baz.”

“You clearly  _ can’t _ take it,” he scoffs. “Fuck, I can’t drop you off at the library like this. You’re going home, okay?”

I try to protest, but he turns the car around and drives it right back to me and Penny’s apartment. We’re both sitting there, me bawling, Baz stiff and tight-lipped, trying to act like this is perfectly normal behaviour whenever someone passes by. I cry and cry until I feel like I’m perfectly exhausted, like there’s no tears left, and then I start thinking about something else, and I start crying again.

Baz looks guilty and pained in the rearview mirror, but he doesn’t say anything.

“God, just. Why are we so bad at this?” I say finally. “Why was that the first honest thing you’ve said to me in the past year?”

“It’s not the first honest thing,” Baz snaps back. “You think that the only honest things are the bad ones.”

That hits me like a tonne of bricks. All of a sudden I’m scrambling into the passenger seat, leaning over the console into Baz. I bury my face in his chest, not crying anymore, just sort of heaving. He’s frozen for a second - then he tips his head back. Starts running his fingers through my hair.

“I’m sorry,” I mumble into the fabric of his soft button-down. “You should break up with me.”

He stiffens and pushes me off. “Simon. Stop saying that.”

“Why? It’s true.”

“Stop telling me what to do!” he shouts. A couple of heads turn in the street. He unlocks the car and storms out. “Just - come up.”

He’s taking the steps two at a time, quickly and gracefully, even though on anyone else it would definitely be stomping. I follow him slowly. He’s already let himself into the flat when I make it up the stairs.

He falls onto the couch. I balance myself on the arm of Penny’s reading chair.

“I need you,” he says in a forcibly measured tone, “to  _ stop _ saying that, because it makes me feel like you don’t want me around. Like I’m an annoyance to you. Like I’m weak and pathetic for sticking with you.”

He’s doing the therapy-speak thing. (He started therapy when I mentioned that I’ve gone back. I’m not sure if he actually thinks he needs it, or if it’s some sort of guilt trip to keep me going to mine.) Normally, that annoys me to no end, the  _ I statements  _ and the bloody  _ feelings _ . But Baz’s words keep echoing in my head.

“You’re not weak,” I retort. “You’re the strongest person I know. I just - I don’t want you to  _ have  _ to be. I don’t think I’m worth it.”

“Fine,” he snaps. “But I do. We’re going to have to agree to disagree. I’ll respect that you don’t think you’re worth it, and you’ll have to respect that I do.”

I don’t know what to say to that. So I just say, “Okay.”

“Okay.” He sits up fully on the couch. “Since I’m skipping uni today, do you want to watch a movie?”

The tight knot loosens in my chest. Kind of the way it did when I first kissed Baz in the burning forest. Like we’ve solved something. Or - maybe not solved. But at least started to fix. Started to  _ build _ . I replay his words in my head again. “ _ We’re going to have to agree to disagree _ .” Baz thinks I’m worth it - and he’s the smartest person I know.

I sit down on the couch next to him and knock my shoulder against his. “Only if it’s  _ Star Wars _ .”

“No,” he shakes his head vigorously. “This is  _ you _ apologising to  _ me _ . We’re watching  _ Roman Holiday _ .”

“Not  _ again _ !” I groan. “How about we just. Talk?”

Baz raises an eyebrow. “Talk?”

“Yeah...talk.”

JUNE

Baz is curled up on my bed, face in his hands. I’m sitting on the floor by my dresser. (We don’t get in the bed together.)

“It’s just...I don’t want to say it. It’s stupid.”

I can’t help the smile that curls across my lips, even though we’re both upset. “It’s not stupid. Nothing you say is stupid. Just, out with it.”

He flops onto his back and stares at the ceiling. “I didn’t mean what I said. I was just mad about last week. With Agatha.”

My brow furrows. “What about Agatha?” She’d been here for a bit, to visit us and her family when her quarter in San Diego ended. Baz had seemed perfectly happy, glad even, to see her.

“I don’t know...sometimes I just think that you don’t want to be with me. Especially after you got upset at me for holding your hand at Starbucks.”

_ That was three weeks ago! _ I want to yell. But I’m not supposed to interrupt. (But, Crowley. How many times can I apologize?)

“Look, I know you say you want to be with me and I’m trying to trust you on that, but it made me jealous. Seeing you in that house, with her. I just kept thinking,  _ that that’s where you belong _ . Where you would have been, if you hadn’t come to mine for Christmas - or if you’d actually gone back when she came to get you.”

I pull on my hair because this is the twelfth time we’ve had this conversation about Agatha. “Okay, do you want me to stop being friends with Agatha?”

“No!” he yells. “It’s just. It’s just a  _ thing _ . That exists. You don’t have to do anything.”

I breathe deeply. “Okay.”

“But I want you to be able to hold my hand at Starbucks. Not now, but...eventually.”

This time, I actually let myself smile. “Yeah. Okay. I will, I promise. Next time we go to Starbucks. I just didn’t expect it, before.”

“It doesn’t have to be next time, I said  _ eventually _ . You’re just going to do it because I’m upset with you about this stupid Agatha thing, not because you want to do it.”

I put my foot on the bed and hit Baz in the knee with it. “Shut up. I want to. I’m not lying. Let’s go to Starbucks now. Like, right now.”

Baz looks both suspicious and delighted. “Really?”

I use the edge of the bed to hoist myself off the floor and hold my hand out for him. “Yes, really. I want you to buy me an overpriced pastry because this fight has really taken it out of me, and I’m starved. Physically and emotionally.”

He lets me pull him out of bed, and we shuffle around the flat, gathering shoes and keys and sunglasses. The thought occurs to me when I look at the date on my phone, and I know I probably shouldn’t say it - because things seem fragile now, after this fight about Agatha - but I like to just let things out now without thinking too hard about them. (It works out for me some of the time.)

“It’s a year since we were in California, today. It’s been a year since I tried to break up with you.”

Baz pulls on his Oxfords. “You tried to break up with me two months ago.”

“Okay, what I mean is it’s been a year since I  _ actually _ meant it. Since I thought that was the only way to make things better for the two of us.”

Baz looks up. “You don’t mean it anymore?”

“You know I don’t,” I huff, although I will repeat it as many times as Baz needs me to. “It’s just - something I do when I’m scared, when I’m trying to stay in control. And I’m really trying not to say it anymore. And I'm sorry.”

Baz narrows his eyes at me. I wonder if I’ve ruined everything, but he just stands back up and smiles. “Okay. Well, here’s to a year, Simon.”

I interlace our fingers as we walk out of the flat. “Here’s to a year, Baz.”

**Author's Note:**

> sorry if this is too angsty. but like, come on, after wayward son, is anything too angsty? (I actually just re-read WS, and I think it's more hopeful than I first thought.)
> 
> let me know what you think of the fic! and if Rainbow will make things better for these two in AWTWB...?


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